Low-Cost Raspberry Pi on Sale

By Nick Clayton

The original vision for the credit-card sized Raspberry Pi computer was that it would cost $25 and be manufactured in the U.K. The Model B, which was released last year, cost $35 and was made in China.

By September, however, production had been moved to South Wales in the U.K. and Monday the $25 Model A went on sale in Europe, with the rest of the world to follow. This version should be even more affordable for kids and encourage them to program, the main objective of the Raspberry Pi Foundation.

The Model A doesn’t have an Ethernet port, has 256MB of RAM — half that of the Model B — and one USB port.

The board consumes roughly one-third of the power of the Model B. The low-power Model A is suited to being used as a media centre, for robotics or embedded computing, Raspberry Pi Foundation chairman Eben Upton told ZDNet .

“The Model A board is the next item in the Raspberry Pi range to be manufactured exclusively in Wales by Sony in partnership with element14,” said Claire Doyle, Global Head of Raspberry Pi at element14.

Distributor element14 has also launched two accessories to support the development of new applications and uses: The Gertboard, a flexible experimenter board that connects the Raspberry Pi out to the physical world, and PiFace, which allows the user to sense and control the real world.

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